ABOVE: Elliot Page in ‘Umbrella Academy.’ (Photo courtesy Netflix)
There’s been a lot of bad news over these last couple of weeks, and there’s no way to sugar-coat it. The Supreme Court seems determined to roll back the clock to an era when rights belonged only to a privileged few, and that’s just one current in an endless stream of worrisome developments that make watching the news enough to give even the most optimistic among us a sense of, well, impending doom.
Still, in such overwhelming times, it’s crucial to remind ourselves that good things happen, too, even if they tend to get lost in the shadows; and even in an easily catastrophized set of circumstances like the one we’re facing now, there’s a cultural moment taking place that deserves to be acknowledged — and you don’t even have to turn on the news to see it, because it’s on Netflix.
In 2019, when the streaming giant premiered its adaptation of “The Umbrella Academy,” Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá’s Dark Horse comic book series about a dysfunctional family of superhero siblings, it was already at the forefront of the industry in terms of LGBTQ representation in its lineup; with two queer characters among its leading cast, the new show was no exception. Well-received by critics, the series was also embraced by fans, becoming one of Netflix’s most-streamed titles of the year. A second season debuted in 2020, further expanding the tale’s queer storylines and meeting with similar success.
Now, after a pandemic-slowed production schedule, the much-anticipated third season has finally appeared, and it’s a ray of positivity in our current sea of woes. The reason has nothing to do with the show’s wild-and-wooly fantasy narrative about bickering superheroes time-hopping from one narrowly averted apocalypse to another — although as with all the best fantasy stories, it’s easy to draw a few notable parallels with real life. Indeed, it’s a real-life parallel that gives this season its real significance — and it’s only there because of Elliot Page.
Page has been part of “Umbrella Academy” since the beginning, and is the show’s biggest “name,” but when he came out as trans in 2020, his presence in the cast took on even more importance. How the series would handle his transition suddenly became the most important question on the minds of the show’s creators – especially since, as showrunner Steve Blackman recently revealed, the scripts had already been written. To their great credit, the show’s creative team handled things right; they brought in trans writer Thomas Page McBee, who worked with Page and Blackman to craft a rewrite that would allow Vanya Hargreeves, Page’s already-established character, to transition in the story, too.
The result is perhaps a bigger success than any of them – or of us – might have expected. On the surface of it, the change is executed without much ado. Early in the season’s first episode, Vanya simply shows up at a family meeting and announces that he is now Viktor, and that’s that. His siblings accept him, and everyone just moves on to the business of figuring out how to save the universe from yet another existential threat.
Wisely, however, the show doesn’t merely make the change and then move forward as if nothing has really happened. Viktor’s new gender identity may have nothing to do with the main plot, but it is clearly pertinent to himself and his siblings, and we get to watch these relationships adjust as they process the change. These moments are small, but important; it’s a testament to the show’s excellent writing that each character meets the moment in a way that’s in keeping with their own unique persona. That none of them chooses to be unkind makes for good “behavior modeling,” certainly, teaching audiences by example how to approach similar encounters with transitioning loved ones in their own lives — but it also rings true within the narrative itself, underscoring the deep loyalty to each other that repeatedly emerges as this not-as-broken-as-they-think family’s most valuable asset in its fight against universal destruction. After all, when you’re facing the end of the world, what hero has time to argue about pronouns?
The show, too, gives both Page and Viktor ample opportunities to experience those little “aha” moments that are so much a part of transitioning into a more complete, more authentic version of oneself. From the self-discovery of seeing himself in his first “boy” haircut, to the expansion of empathy he feels for the struggles faced by his siblings, to his ability to just be, at long last, comfortable enough in his own skin to dance with complete abandon despite the impending end of the world – all these and more are nuances that don’t NEED to be there, but were nevertheless included by choice. “The Umbrella Academy,” violent and irreverent as it may be, has never been shallow, but in its determination to present a positive and authentic transition experience and honor that journey for both character, actor, and audience alike, it sounds new and unexpected depths, and it’s all the better for doing so.
It’s worth pointing out some other reverberations that Viktor’s transition sets off in the overall premise of the show. He is after all, part of an ethnically diverse family whose members all struggle to overcome the childhood trauma they experienced under the supposed care (really exploitation) of a narcissistic adoptive father, a man with all the earmarks of a white imperialist colonizer who rationalizes his abuses in the name of the greater good. Damaged, divided, and combative, they’ve long since grown disillusioned with the old man’s vision for their lives, yet it continues to shape their lives and their behavior as surely as if it were in their mutated DNA. Add to this the fact that the apocalypses they keep having to avert tend to be of their own creation, and it’s hard not to see “The Umbrella Academy” as a subversive metaphor for America itself – yet one that is enlightened enough to embrace Viktor Hargreeves (and his other queer sibling, the pansexual fan-favorite Klaus, played by Robert Sheehan) with complete acceptance.
Clever allegorical touches aside, it’s this season’s pitch-perfect, elegantly drawn transition of Viktor that elevates the show to historic status. It does what no show has ever done before: it gives us a character that fans already know and love, in whom they are already invested, and then they let us see that character come out as their authentic self. From Edith Bunker’s doomed drag queen friend Beverly on “All in the Family,” to Pedro Zamora’s presence in “The Real World,” to Cam and Mitch’s long-running gay marriage on “Modern Family,” game-changing queer representation on popular television shows has played an immeasurable but undeniable role in advancing LGBTQ acceptance in our culture; Viktor Hargreeves is just such a character, a benchmark in trans representation that feels like the harbinger of a sea change to come, despite the ominous threats of our seemingly unhinged SCOTUS.
“The Umbrella Academy” can’t save us from the impending apocalypse in our own world, but maybe it can supply us with the hope we need to do it ourselves.
